The Moreau Factor (2000) by Jack L. Chalker

Author:Jack L. Chalker
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2012-02-01T01:16:24+00:00

TEN

My yacht was not nearly as large, as luxurious, nor as comfortable as The Songs of Sunset but it almost certainly had a friendlier, less hostile crew.

It was called the Prince of Anguilla and was under B.W.I. registry, and it had been used for everything from short interisland cruises to carrying supplies, people, and cargo where they shouldn't have been. When the Moresby Agency got hold of it, it had been seized by the British Navy off Baruda with a considerable amount of Golden Triangle opium aboard. Sold at auction, the Bahamas-based Moresby Agency had bought it because it was just what they needed for the kinds of jobs they specialized in, like sneaking in and out of island nations and territories unobserved and staking out small harbors and yacht basins. What was interesting was that, while all three agency crew members were Caribbean natives who spoke with that distinctive island accent, none of them were Bahamian. George Samuels was a big, hulking black man with another of those melodic voices of doom and he was a native of Antigua; Rita Tompkins was a strikingly beautiful woman, chocolate brown in complexion, with shoulder-length straight hair, and she'd been born on Tobago. Roger Dees, a lithe, athletic man with a medium complexion, but more European—probably British—features, was from Grenada. At least, that's what they all told me. I had the impression that none of them were quite what they seemed to be, but that they were indeed all agents of the widest-ranging private detective agency in the English-speaking Caribbean and that this was their "retirement"

from a related occupation not ever mentioned.

Still, I always wondered if I'd find the graves of a Roger Dees in Grenada somewhere, a Rita Tompkins on Tobago, and a George Samuels on Antigua. They were that kind of people.

Normally, stuck in a place like Freeport on an expense account with a nice resort, good weather, big casino, you name it, I would have been in heaven, but, the fact was, I hadn't enjoyed a moment of the time there. All I could think about was green and mottled people and a robotic Karen waiting on them, maybe while turning into something odd and exotic.

Even with just the basic fast boat, I was glad to be under way, and anxious to see a certain ship once again.

George, who was in charge of the boat and also the nominal leader of the pack, sat back in the exposed upper pilot's chair and relaxed as we cleared the harbor and he started gunning it. He knew just where he was going; we were connected to the nets and satellite links here as surely as if we were doing an automobile rally somewhere.

Rita came up top with the full-blown computer analyzer and pointed it at us.

She then said, "Okay, you two. Everybody's clean, de boat is clean, and we got de free routine bugs heading for Cuba, so relax and speak if you want to."

Samuels chuckled. "Dat's Rita. Always de joker. Planted dose transponders on a Cuban diplomatic boat.

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